Arms Export Licences: Israel

Debate between Zarah Sultana and Bell Ribeiro-Addy

Tuesday 12th December 2023 Westminster Hall

[Zarah Sultana]

Many hands are going up—I will give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Streatham (Bell Ribeiro-Addy)

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for securing this extremely important debate. She has touched on the arms sales, which have continued over a number of years, and on the fact that the UK has continued to supply arms to Israel, which I believe makes us complicit in the occupation of the west bank and the use of arms to suppress people there. She said she was going to talk about the precedents we have had for suspending arms sales where it is clear that there are concerns about their benefiting human rights violations. Does my hon. Friend agree that this could be very much like the time the UK had an embargo on the sale of arms to Israel from 1982 to 1984, following the Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

[Zarah Sultana]

Yes, I agree. In the past, we have shown that we can take leadership, and I mentioned the example of when David Cameron stopped arms sales, although we resumed them afterwards. On this occasion, we can see that clear violations of international law are taking place, and we cannot continue arms sales.

I will make a bit of progress. What makes the Government’s refusal to suspend arms sales even more horrifying is that Israeli officials have been quite open about their intent in Gaza. At the beginning of the assault, an Israeli military spokesperson said that “the emphasis” of bombing was on

“damage and not on accuracy”.

Another official promised to turn Gaza into a “city of tents”, while the former head of the Israeli National Security Council said that the aim was to make Gaza

“a place where no human being can exist.”

The National Security Minister said that the only thing that should enter Gaza is

“not a gram of humanitarian aid”

but

“hundreds of tons of explosives”.

More recently, an Israeli Minister said that the war would be “Gaza’s Nakba”, which is a reference to the 1948 catastrophe in which hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were forcibly expelled from their homes and never allowed to return. Given that stated intent, and actions to match it, UN experts have warned of a “genocide in the making”. Let us be clear: if this is a genocide in the making, British-made weapons are almost certainly part of making that genocide happen.

None of that is to deny or downplay Hamas’s appalling attack on 7 October, when 1,200 people—the majority civilians—were killed. I condemn that attack once again, as I have done repeatedly in the Chamber, and call again for the release of all hostages. As I have also said before, echoing the words of the UN Secretary-General, those crimes do not excuse what we have witnessed since.

Unlike those awful crimes, Israel’s assault on Gaza has been carried out with the Government’s unequivocal support and with British-made weapons. Disgracefully, selling arms for war crimes is not new for British Governments. Following Israel’s Operation Protective Edge in 2014, which human rights organisations said violated international law, the Conservative-led coalition Government undertook an investigation into arms sales to Israel, finding that those arms could have been used by the Israeli military in Gaza. That resulted in the Government committing to suspend sales if Israel resumed its military assault.